← Back to Blog

Lascar sailors of Hartlepool

Lascar sailors, or South Asian and Southeast Asian sailors, worked on ships across the world. In this guest blog from Hartlepool Museums Service we look into those who worked on ships built in Hartlepool in the 1920s and the challenges they faced from British sailors.

A photo of Lascar sailors who survived the wreck of the SS Clavering. Image courtesy of Hartlepool Museums and Heritage Service.

The Wreck of the Clavering

It was a cold and blustery day when the SS Clavering got into trouble off the North East coast. The sky had been dark but calm when the crew set out from Middlesbrough in the early hours. Laden with 5,000 tons of pitch, iron and other goods, she was bound for Japan – but she would not make it past Seaton Carew.

For a day and a night, sailors from Seaton Carew and Hartlepool fought freezing waves to save the crew. Of the 62 men who departed Middlesbrough, 19 died, many succumbing to the cold while they waited for rescue.

The survivors, cold and wet, were taken to Middlesbrough where their arrival caused a stir. Newspapers reported on the event, accompanied by photographs. One such photograph is now in the museum’s collection. It shows rows of South Asian and Southeast Asian sailors dressed in borrowed clothes. Some look tired, some defiant, but for most it’s a mystery how they felt. Still, this postcard is a glimpse into the presence of Lascar sailors on British ships.

But why were these South Asian and Southeast sailors on British ships and what does the term “Lascar” even mean?

Who were the Lascars?

There is a long history to the term “Lascar” and of South Asian sailors working on British ships. Back in the early 1500s the term was used by the Portuguese for Asian sailors crewing ships. Though as time passed the term came to refer to any sailor of non-European or American origin. The growth of the East India Company and the expansion of the British Empire, the numbers of Lascar sailors on British ships increased. Sailors from the Indian sub-continent become a critical part of the shipping industry. By 1914 there were 51,000 Lascars working on British ships. That was 17.5% of the whole workforce.

Their presence was felt on Hartlepool ships well into the twentieth century also. The Dunelmia was built in Hartlepool for a local shipping company. The papers of the company in the museum’s collection record the ships voyages across the globe. Some further digging reveals the names of some of the crew. Sailors like Abdul Jabbar and Mohamed Idris worked in the hottest part of the Dunelmia as Donkeymen and Firemen, tending to the engines and stoking the furnaces. Their names, and those of other Lascar sailors, appear on the crew lists of the Hartlepool ships from 1938 to 1947.

The Dunelmia's ship book. Image courtesy of Hartlepool Museums and Heritage Service.

On the ships

The government and shipping companies sought to tightly police the experience of Lascar sailors. Rules were drafted that required Lascar sailors to stay in separate lodgings. As one official for the Indian office put it in 1923 –

It is better both for the Indian Seaman and for the Ship owner that they should not go to these places. The more [lascars] mix with Europeans the more ambitious they become to obtain European wages and European conditions.

By keeping the South Asian sailors separate, Lascar wages could be kept at a fraction of the wages of unionised European sailors. For the same voyage in 1936 a British Donkeyman was paid £10 12 s 9p per month, while a Lascar Donkeyman was paid just 28 Rupees. Yet just because rules are drafted that doesn’t mean they were followed. Indeed the 1921 census records at least one Bombay sailor, John Ciba, who was lodging at John Street West Hartlepool. Here amongst other sailors from around the globe sailors at least one lascar sailor lived. Despite the rules and policies of officials he made a home in Hartlepool.

Though officials might sometimes lack control on land, ships were a space they could, and did, control. Crew quarters were carefully mapped and separated, designed to prevent the crews mixing and spreading ideas like Elder Dempster’s ships the Dixcove and Degema, whose plans laid out separate galleys for the African crew.

The Dixcove. Image courtesy of Hartlepool Museums and Heritage Service.

The SS City of Manilla. Image courtesy of Hartlepool Museums and Heritage Service.

This environment could be isolating and stressful as one former Lascar sailor recounted year later in his memoir. In 1914, ‘Dada’ Amir Haider Khan and his fellow Lascar sailors were sent to West Hartlepool to crew the SS City of Manilla on its maiden voyage. Far from his Pakistan home, Haider Khan found the town, “neat and tidy, and the people seemed healthy and amiable” as he shopped for the goods needed for the voyage ahead.

But on the ship was a more hostile experience. Khan compared being a Lascar to being a prisoner, with little say on your work or space. When the Lascars did protest their work conditions, they found no support from their fellow sailors in Hartlepool. The Lascars left the ship until an abusive Serang (foreman) was removed. But, while their protest was successful, Haider Khan remembered the lack of support from the fellow workers –

Some workmen were working on the deck and roundabout there. They also had their eyes on us…
They never expected such unanimous and spontaneous protest from the galley slaves like us… They all were members of various labour and trade union organizations. But no one from amongst them approached us as a worker to advise us the other workers who were on strike, or to give us any help.

The City of Adelaide. Image courtesy of Hartlepool Museums and Heritage Service.

Legacy

Despite the harsh conditions and the hostility, they faced, the Lascars work was crucial to the success of British shipping. Never was this more evident than during world wars when thousands were recruited for the war effort. On ships built in Hartlepool and beyond, sailors like John Ciba served – and in many cases lost their lives. In the British Library, the records of their war pensions highlight the lives some of them left behind in in the subcontinent. Like Hajira Banu and Latiba Banu whose husband and son died on the Hartlepool built ship the City of Adelaide in 1918.

The history of the Lascars highlights the deep global connections forged through maritime trade. From India and Bangladesh to the shores of Hartlepool, their lives were intertwined through ships, labour, and empire.

Will Catlin's Pierrots

Will Catlin’s Pierrots were a well-known sight on the north-east coast, performing on the beaches and their own open-air theatre in Scarborough.

The Matchmaker of Hartlepool: Evelyn Harrison’s Legacy

Brass Crosby and the Freedom of the Press

One evening in February 1905, in the hall of Stockton’s Literary and Philosophical Society in Dovecot Street, a barbershop owner named Joseph Parrott told a packed room the story of Brass Crosby, a Mayor of London who had been born in Stockton.

Back to all Blog posts

Lascar sailors of Hartlepool

You might also like

Will Catlin's Pierrots

The Matchmaker of Hartlepool: Evelyn Harrison’s Legacy

Brass Crosby and the Freedom of the Press